There are many blogs and articles on the interwebs about add-ons and customizing your UI for endgame raiding at level 80, but what about all the lower level characters out there? Is there any add-on or UI you can get to make leveling effortless and painless?

Well…the short and simple answer is no. Remember first and foremost, there is no uber add-on that will make you fly through quests with ease and make all the mobs in the game tremble before you in fear with no effort on your part while getting you to level 80 in record time. No matter what add-ons you use it is still up to you, sitting there at the keyboard, to get your character thru the game all the way to level 80. However, there are plenty of add-ons and ways to arrange your UI that will make leveling thru the game far easier, much less painful, and maybe even enjoyable (it is a game after all).

Once you’ve chosen your add-ons and have them all downloaded and installed you have to figure out where to put them on your screen in a way that works well for you. Here are some things to keep in mind when thinking about what should go where.

As you play thru the game most of the action will be taking place in the middle portion of the screen. When you are fighting for your life the less your eyes have to look away from that area the better. That is a good place to put add-ons and things you use during combat like unit frames, buff bars, action bars (for those of us who always seem to have a hard time remembering what spell is on what button).

Things you don’t use during combat like maps, quest logs, and minimaps can be put anywhere on screen but I suggest keeping them towards the outside so they don’t interfere with your ability to see what is going on on screen as you wander around the world.

Utility add-ons like titan panel and fubar are designed to go along the top and/or bottom edge of the screen for a reason. That is a good place to put things you will only use or look at once in a while.

So using my own UI as an example I will show you what I use, how I arrange it on the screen, and my reasons for doing so. Hopefully you will see some ideas you will find helpful in arranging your own UI. Please keep in mind these add-ons and UI setup are not the best way to do things, they are only the way that works best for me at this particular time and I encourage anyone who reads this to find a way to do every piece of it better.

I design my UI around the three main phases of game play.

1. Getting from point A to point B (knowing where to go and how to get there).
2. Being in hostile territory (you have arrived at the area where the quest objective is and there just happens to be a whole lot of monsters there waiting for you).
3. Combat (monster A says “I’m gonna kill you and eat you”, you say “ummm….no”, monster A decides to argue the point)

Let’s start with the most simple one, getting from point A to point B.

Add-ons to help with knowing where to go and how to get there would be things like map mods, minimap mods, quest log mods and quest helpers. I try to arrange my add-ons around the screen so as to leave as much open space as possible so I can see what is happening around me as I wander across the land. It’s a big game and there are a lot of pretty cool things to see out there. Also, if there is a mob sitting next to that tree up ahead I’d like to see it before it pounces on me, even if I have the map or quest log open while I’m running around. Here is what my screen looks like as I wander around.

Not much going on, lots of wide open space and I can clearly see where I’m going and what is going on around me. I like to have only my utility buttons (buttons that are not used for combat, thinks like food, bandages, poisons, mounts, whatever) visible. For buffs I use elkano buffbars and I keep them down in the corner where they are out of the way but still easily visible. Chat windows/combat log are big enough to be easily readable without being a distraction. For keeping track of game info like bag space, money, durability, communication lag, as well as easy access to various addon management tools I use fubar and keep it down on the bottom of the screen. Titan panel works just as well if you prefer. The main thing is to keep it in an out of the way place and to have it show the info you care about. Which reminds me, it would be good to know where I need to be going and what I am supposed to be doing when I get there. So I open my map and questlog and this is what my screen looks like then.

Still lots of open space and I can still see what is going on around me. For the map I use cartographer for my map mainly because of the ability to make all the unnecessary map area (everything in the map window that is not part of the zone I am in) invisible. The less map there is on the screen the more screen I can see. I keep it up in the corner at a size big enough to see the arrow marker (me) and any points of interest marked on the map. I also turn down the opacity but not very much since I want to be able to clearly read the map, but enough so that if anything moves behind it I will be able to notice the motion.

For the minimap I use sexymap. It has all the things a minimap mod should (it’s moveable, it handles the minimap buttons well, and it can show coordinates) and just plain looks cool. When I’m running around my eyes are usually on or near my character so by putting the minimap below my character my peripheral vision can usually notice any yellow dots (herbs, ore, treasure) exclamation marks, or question marks that appear while I am watching the world go by. If the minimap were over in one of the corners I would have a harder time catching them without looking directly at the minimap as I run around instead of paying attention to where I’m going.

For the quest log and quest help I use nquestlog, and doublewide for the versatility they provide in showing log windows and lightheaded for quest help info. I keep the nquestlog minion in the opposite corner from the map. I have it set to be invisible until I mouse over it and once the mouse is moved off of it it fades back to invisibility after 5 seconds. Just like I did for the map, I turned down the opacity on the minion enough so that I can see the info clearly as well as being able to see anything moving around behind it. The same thing goes for the quest log and lightheaded windows.

I have the windows big enough to read easily and quickly and I turned down the opacity enough so that I can see the info clearly while still being able to see something running up to attack me.

Phase two: Hostile territory

I’m getting close to where I’m supposed to be but there are lots of monsters around, many of which will likely try to kill me when they see me. Something tells me it might be a good idea to kill them first so I target the closest one. This is what my screen looks like at that point.

The main thing I want to do in this phase is to keep my attention on my character and the mob, both of which are around the middle of the screen. I don’t want my eyes wandering all over the screen looking for how much health the mob has or what button I put my first attack on. I try to have the unit frames and buttons close enough to be easily visible while being spaced out enough so I can actually see the fight when it happens (what’s the point in fighting something if you can’t actually see the fight).

For action bar and button management I use bartender 4. The buttons I will be using during combat are only visible when I target a mob I can hurt, or that can hurt me. As soon as I deselect the target the buttons turn invisible again. My main action bar (the one under the mob unit frame) is also the possess bar so any buttons used when riding a vehicle or possessing an npc will show up there).

As for the button layout, you might look at them and say, ummm… are you on crack? Believe it or not there is actually a reason for that arrangement. I try to keep my button layouts as comfortable and intuitive as possible. I’ve always hated the default setting of using just the upper number keys and have got into the habit of using the number pad keys on my main action bar and only using the uppers for secondary actions like health and mana pots or vanish/escape buttons. Looking at my keyboard in the picture below the buttons used by my right hand during a fight are outlined in green while the buttons used by my left hand are outlined in blue.

I try to place my action bar buttons on the screen in a way that is similar to how the buttons are laid out on the keyboard. For the uppers I break it up into 3 rows of 4 buttons each only to maintain a balanced look and overall feel to the UI. To have all the uppers in one row would extend the bar to the edge of the screen and pull my eyes further away from the action in the middle. As for the arrow keys, I use those for before and after fight actions like the rogue’s stealth, or the various stances for warriors. Since I don’t use those actions much during a fight I place the buttons down on the bottom right corner of the minimap. The downside to doing all this is that some bars have buttons on them that don’t get used and are, for lack of a better term, wasted. Fortunately I have yet to reach a point in the game where I need more buttons than I have so it works for me. Here is a shot of the layout from the configure screen for better visibility.

The last phase, combat, is where the rush of information and action is either going to confuse and overwhelm you so that you end up mashing your action buttons and hoping for a good outcome, or if you can make sense of it all, it will help you manage each fight effectively and therefore make killing mobs, gaining experience and progressing thru the game much easier.

The main things you need to know, like how much damage you are doing to the mob, how much damage the mob is doing to you, debuffs on you and the mob, and when your abilities finish their cooldown. When I first started playing having all that info just pop up in the middle of the characters fighting it out on screen got too confusing as I got into the higher levels and I did and took more damage from a variety of sources and abilities. So to separate it all out and keep it easily visible I use mik scrolling battle text for the damage and cooldown info and quartz for casting bars (mine and the mobs) and debuffs on the mob.

Here is how I have the scrolling text laid out.

Damage and healing done to me moves from upper left to lower right above my unit frame. Damage and healing done to the mob move from lower left to upper right above the mob unit frame. Notifications of abilities expiring (slice ‘n dice expires) or trinkets finishing their cooldown appear in the notifications box in the middle and move from bottom to top. Static info (items picked up/money looted) appears in the static info area just above the minimap.

Here are a few shots of how it all looks using a few different characters. First my rogue.

Here is a shot of this style of UI layout on my deathknight to show what it looks like in a fight with a bit more info flowing around the screen.

That about sums up how I go about arranging my UI for leveling/pve play. I’d love to hear any thoughts, questions, or comments you may have.

Header image courtesy of clix